Updates for my past posts about Disney princesses and Tesla

I recently wrote posts about both Disney Princesses (and their dresses) and about Tesla and other electric cars. These are a few fun updates to those posts.

Cinderella electric carI wrote two posts in the past few days that have already been overtaken by events. The first post was about my disdain for Tesla, which I see as a rich people’s car built on poor people’s backs. The second post was about the impact Disney Princesses have on American women — and why.

My Tesla post is adequate, but the comments my readers have left are splendid, including updated information about battery technology. I have one more comment I want to add to the subject, plus a great link to a post at Zero Hedge. The comment is that, yes, it’s true that America’s rich people pay most of America’s taxes, so one can reasonably argue that they’re just getting their own money back — which is a point I’ve made in past posts over the years regarding electric cars. However, to the extent the taxpaying working class has any of its taxes siphoned off to Tesla, I think that’s wrong.

Also, a significant percentage of America’s tax revenue comes from corporations (corporations other than Tesla, I guess). You know and I know, though, that corporations don’t hang on to the deficits occasioned by their tax obligations. Instead, they pass those costs on to consumers. So when Wal-Mart has a hefty tax bill, it raises the prices on its products by a few pennies here and a few pennies there. I can easily absorb those increases. Poor people cannot, making corporate taxes an extremely regressive form of taxation.

The other update I want to add to my Tesla post is that Zero Hedge points out that governments around the world are announcing that all cars within their jurisdictions must be electric within “X” number of years. Those laws will bring problems even an elementary school child should be able to predict:

Most people will never accept this. Would you accept waiting 30-45 minutes (absolute best-case scenario, if a “fast” charger is available) to put a partial charge back into your EV? Were you aware that at the high-voltage “fast” chargers, due to the nature of the thing (and for the sake of battery life) you cannot put more than 80 percent charge back into the thing?

So, whatever the advertised best-case range of the car is, subtract 20 percent.

That puts even the longest-ranged of them in the same class as the fiercest-guzzling IC-engined SUV. Maybe 200 miles or so. But the fierce-guzzling SUV can be refueled to 100 percent in 5 minutes.

Which would you prefer to take on a road trip? One where there might not be a “fast” charger available when you run out of juice. What then?

Then, you spend overnight wherever you happen to be.

Electric car freaks peddle a Disney-esque fantasy to counter this objection. They envision everyone plugging in at home, overnight – or at work, while they work. The problem with this idea is the ant-like uniformity of use it assumes. Everyone going to work – and back home – at pretty much the same time.

Exactly! You also need to factor in the fact that, if California goes all-electric, but neighboring states don’t, there’s no way California drivers can take their cars outside of California borders. The moment you get to Nevada or Oregon, your electric car becomes a huge problem.

I don’t have any changes to make or new ideas to add to my Cinderella/Princess dress post. However, With perfect timing, the conservative blogosphere has been lighting up about the fact that a leftist mommy took it upon herself to edit her almost-3-year-old daughter’s Disney book:

Danielle Lindemann thought that as a sociologist who studies gender roles she was pretty attuned to gender stereotypes, but having a daughter of her own “cranked that awareness up to a whole new level.” When she came across one of her daughter’s favorite Disney princess books, she decided to give it a bit of a feminist makeover to teach her nearly 3-year-old daughter some important lessons.

The constant inundation with princess stuff drives me crazy,” Danielle, a professor of sociology at Lehigh University, told POPSUGAR Moms. “Because it’s basically teaching these little girls that their worth lies in looking nice and hooking up with the right guy. Still. In 2016.” When her daughter received the princess book as a gift, this feeling drove Danielle to add little comments onto each page to make it a bit more badass.

[snip]

“A princess is kind of a badass.”

 

“A princess is a dreamer: ‘It would be great to see more women in the Senate . . .'”

 

“A princess loves to see new things, like a federal standard for paid maternity leave.”

 

“A princess is brave: ‘My body, my choice.'”

 

“Jasmine flies through the sky. She holds onto Aladdin because he is scared.”

 

“A princess likes to dress up in her medical scrubs when she goes to work as a neurosurgeon.”

You know what? I bet that, when this gal’s little girl grows up, she is still going to want a Princess dress and, assuming she’s straight, will still hope one day to fall in love and get married to her own personal prince. With a Mom like that, though, it’s hard to imagine that little girl having a sense of humor.